To Make A Million
by Bright Morning Star
Summary: Flat broke and in need of quick cash, Calvin schemes to steal an item from the future to 'invent' in the present - but time-thievery is risky business. An ally who has something in common with Calvin may save the day...if he can believe the impossible.
1. Chapter 1

Title: **To Make A Million **Category: Comics » Calvin & Hobbes Author: Bright Morning Star Language: English, Rating: Rated: K+ Genre: Adventure/Humor Published: 01-20-08, Updated: 04-12-08 Chapters: 6, Words: 16,655

**Chapter 1: Chapter 1**

"To make a million"

By Bright Morning Star

Disclaimer: I don't take credit for creating Calvin or Hobbes; they and their family were the brainchild of the brilliant mind of Bill Watterson. All due credit goes to him alone for creating everything and everyone else in the printed comics this work is based on. I humbly admit to 'standing on the shoulders of a giant' in creating this fanfiction.

Chapter One

"Copper pennies and comic books"

Picture if you will a two-story house in a quiet American suburb on a beautiful June morning. Birds singing their sweet songs, flowers and trees in full bloom, late-model cars driving at reasonable speeds on the roads.

Now picture a boy in that house. A young boy in a striped t-shirt and short jeans, about six years old. He's up in his bedroom with his favorite stuffed tiger at his side, engaged in a favorite activity...counting his money.

This, dear reader, is where it all begins.

"Seventy-one, seventy-two, seventy-three, seventy-four...seventy-five. And that's all."

Calvin looked at the coins in his hand and moaned pitifully. "_One dollar _and seventy-five lousy cents. That's everything in my piggy bank _and _from under the mattress."

With a sigh he rested his head on one hand. Earlier that morning he'd started gathering up his limited funds to go buy a comic book, the latest issue of Nuke-Man. But the good comic books at the local gas station cost $2.50 after taxes. He was all of seventy-five cents short, a princely sum for a young boy. To make matters worse, his allowance didn't come until the end of the week. And the comics he wanted would be long gone by then.

"Oh mannn..._what_ am I gonna _do?_" Calvin whined.

His tiger friend looked nonchalantly at him. "Do about what?"

"My money, Hobbes!"

Hobbes regarded the meager pile of money strewn on the bed sheet. "Let me guess - you 'need' a new comic book?"

"Yes! But that's all the money I have in the world!" Calvin started ticking off points on his fingers. "I emptied my piggy bank, checked all my pockets, looked under the mattress, and looked on my dresser. There isn't another penny to be found. Heck, most of that seventy-five cents _is_ pennies."

"Might I suggest a simple course of action?"

"What?"

"Earn more."

This suggestion earned a massive eye-rolling in reply. "Thank you Captain Obvious. How? Selling lemonade?"

"That's an idea."

Calvin glared daggers for a second before snapping back, "Mom said after the last time we had to buy everything for a lemonade stand ourselves, hairball-breath. And she meant _**everything**_. But I don't even have enough to even buy that nasty powdered lemonade. Never mind stuff like cups or ice."

"Perhaps you could wash the car?"

"Dad took it through the carwash yesterday."

"Oh. Yes. Well, how about pick up sticks in the yard or help mom in her garden?"

"I did that last week. Mom said she'd swat my bare butt with a thistle stem if I messed with her flowers again."

Hobbes raised an eyebrow. "Heavens! When on earth did she say that?"

"Umm...remember the time I tried to make a parachute?"

_"Make a parachute..."_ suddenly Hobbes remembered. "Ah yes. The little incident with your blanket and the bedroom window. If memory serves you came down _right_ on her best roses - and none too gently at that."

"Yeah." Calvin rubbed his backside. "A 'bed of roses' isn't so good as it's cracked up to be. For sure not when you fall on it from twenty feet. But back to the money..."

His tiger friend sighed. "For pity's sake, _must _you get this comic book so soon?"

"Hobbes! If I don't get to the store by Thursday - at the latest - all the good ones will be gone! All that'll be left will be those cheap pulp books!"

"_**So?**_ It's a comic book, not a collectible gold coin."

"But comics **are** collectible! Didn't that guy sell a first-issue Batman for some crazy price just last month? Remember the newspaper story? 'Old comic makes thousands for local man'? If I collect all the Captain Napalm comics ever and keep them in mint condition, I could get rich someday for only spending $2.50!"

Hobbes sighed. _That boy is going to be fresh meat for a get-rich-quick scheme someday..."_All _**right**_ already. If this is so vitally important, how can I help?"

"For starters, you can not be a smart-aleck. When you've got that down, think of something _useful _I can do for some cold hard cash. I'm all out of ideas."

"How about raking leaves? Or mowing lawns?"

"It isn't fall yet. And it would take forever to mow even one lawn with that clunky old push mower."

"Then go find something valuable?"

"Tried that. Checked for coins in both phone booths on our block and all the video games down at Tilt."

"I meant as in digging something up - like a pirate's treasure chest."

"Get real! We're at least a thousand miles from the ocean."

"Old west bandits maybe?"

"Anything they buried has been built over by skyscrapers or pavement by now."

"Hmm. This isn't going to be easy." The big tiger stroked his chin for a minute. Suddenly his face lit up. "You know - this sounds like a job for _Stupendous Man!_"

Calvin shot a withering glance at him. "Were you last in line when they were handing out brains?"

"No," shot back Hobbes, "were you?"

"Shut up. Stupendous Man saves people from evil and catches dangerous criminals - can you imagine how humiliating it would be if he flew up to someone and asked 'hey chum, spare fifty cents for a poor superhero?' "

"Touch-ee! It was just a suggestion."

"Well, suggestion or not, I'm still short fifty cents."

By now Hobbes's patience was wearing thin. "Then why don't you go invent something, have dad help you patent it, and get filthy rich."

"Now _there's _a useful idea. Except...what could I invent?"

"You invented that transmogrifier. That was pretty good, being able to turn someone into any animal you wanted!"

"Hmph. Remember what we found out about that?"

"Not really."

Calvin let out an exaggerated sigh. "It _could _turn you into anything, but never make you any bigger than you were in the first place. And who'd want to turn into an animal, anyway?"

"You did."

"Yeah, well, that was different. I wanted to be a tiger to know what you felt like. Who else has a talking tiger for a friend?"

"Point. But what about the transmogrifier gun?"

"I haven't been able to get it working again since we broke it."

Hobbes shrugged. "So pull out your duplicator. That still works."

"Work_ed._ I learned my lesson the **last **time I duplicated myself. Geez, was _that _ever a mess! I shredded it with dad's box cutter and threw the pieces away."

By now Hobbes had become exasperated. "Then go invent something new and amazing! But don't just sit around here pestering me!"

"Like what? I don't know enough science or math to invent anything that's _worth_ anything."

"Do you need to?"

Although his friend meant it in jest, Calvin missed the sarcasm. "Heck yes! All the simple stuff has already _been _invented Hobbes - you can only 'discover' making fire and safety pins and nail clippers once." In frustration Calvin threw up his hands. "I need something big, something really amazing...like something from a comic book or ...like...like..." suddenly the young boy went silent. A thoughtful look gradually spread across his face.

Hobbes sat up. "Like what?"

"Something...from the _future_." Slowly a wide grin spread over Calvin's face. "I need to invent something super-cool from the future!"

"Whaaat? Now wait a minute - "

"C'mon, Hobbes! I figured out the answer!" With a bound Calvin threw open the door and ran out.

_Oh dear. What in heaven's name can he be thinking of __**now?**_ Hobbes stayed on the bedside for a second, debating wether or not to follow him. In the end his curiosity and sense of loyalty won out. He jumped to the floor and walked, upright, after Calvin.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2: Chapter 2**

Chapter Two "A timely idea"

Calvin bounded down the stairs three at a time and landed on the first floor with a _thump. _He shook himself and ran off without stopping for a second. His tiger friend followed, choosing to slide down the banister before gracefully leaping to the carpet below.

Hobbes found his young friend poking around in the garage.

"It's here, I know it's in here..."

"What's here?"

"Oh! Hi Hobbes," Calvin acknowledged, "look on the top shelves, wouldja?"

"For what?"

"A really _big_ box. It's around here someplace." With those words of advice Calvin returned to searching.

Despite that rather hazy description, Hobbes began looking. There were plenty of boxes sitting around the garage - but no exceptionally large ones he could see right off the bat.

While he continued to look in his usual calm manner, Calvin began flitting about like a mosquito on steroids. "Arrrgh! _Where _did dad put it? He didn't have to _hide _it from me!"

"Hold on now. Just what is this 'it' anyway?"

Instead of answering, the young boy pushed past and peeked behind a rack of metal shelves. "**Aha!**" Gingerly he reached into the dark space and began pulling on the edge of something. After a few dramatic tugs a flattened, dust-covered box slid from behind the shelving. With some effort Calvin lifted it and slowly made his way out of the garage.

As the two made their way towards the front door, Calvin's mother called out to him, not looking up from her morning paper. "Going outside?"

"Yep."

"Playing with your box again?"

"Sure am!"

"Be sure to put it away before suppertime - _and _your stuffed tiger." You know what your father said about leaving your toys out."

"Yes mom."

With that assurance the mother returned to reading the fashion column. Her son going outside to play was usually a good thing - better he go burn off energy outdoors than in.

Calvin proceeded to the backyard with the giant box clutched awkwardly by the top. Finally he set it down and rubbed his sore hands vigorously. "Man, this is murder to carry. Hope it's all okay." With one last rub he began brushing cobwebs off the thick cardboard.

A curious tiger watched for a minute before coughing noisily. "**Ahem**. What is this 'brilliant idea' of yours if I may ask? And what is that big moldy thing you hauled out of the garage?"

That question earned him an irritated glare. " 'Moldy thing?' _'Moldy thing?'_ Just read the words you stripey fleabait! This is what's gonna make us rich and famous!" Calvin heaved the box up on edge.

Hobbes peered at the bold black lettering. "Acme Family Microwave...model TNETS1XEN0N ."

"Other side."

Hobbes walked around to the opposite side of the box, spotted some words scrawled in marker, and began reading them under his breath. Suddenly his feline eyes shot open as wide as saucers.

"Yeah! Meet our good old friend the _**Time Machine**_." Calvin began unfolding the giant box. "Gimme a hand here - this thing is hard to unfold."

"Calvin, for the love of tuna fish have you _completely_ lost your mind? Do you remember what happened the _last time_ we went time-traveling?"

"Sure...we got picture of dinosaurs and almost got rich and famous."

Hobbes looked him straight in the eye. "And also _almost got eaten _by a hungry dinosaur the size of the garage!"

"Oh, you make it sound like we went to Jurassic Park. And it'll be different this time - there won't even _be _any dinosaurs in the future."

"Well of course not," Hobbes said sarcastically, "in the _future_ there'll be things like space pirates and mutants and security robots that zap you to a crisp. We might get _really lucky_ and arrive at the start of a nuclear war, or when evil space aliens are invading! Or what about if the earth is horribly polluted or the future people throw you in a zoo as an exhibit...or..."

Hobbes' frantic predictions slowly faded to silence as he noticed that he had failed to make the slightest impression on Calvin, who was still diligently setting up the Time Machine. He also noticed that his tail had poofed out reflexively, which in his experience was a near-certain sign of impending disaster.

"Hey pal, grab that flap over...ah never mind, I got it."

For a moment Hobbes simply stood in place, contemplating his limited options. Obviously Calvin was on one of his 'adventure streaks' again, which meant he wouldn't be dissuaded by _anything_ short of being hogtied to an immovable object. So he ought to do the sensible thing; stay behind. Refuse to participate in another one of the little monster's hairbrained schemes.

_...and let Calvin probably get himself neck-deep in trouble._

After a fierce battle of wills, Hobbes sighed deeply, twitched his tail and spoke up. "Here. Let me unpack it the rest of the way."

Calvin looked pleasantly surprised. "Huh? Hey, thanks! I'll go find the vortex goggles!" He dashed off back toward the house, returning just as his friend was setting the box upright on the lawn.

"Got 'em?"

"Right there on the shelf. Oh yeah - and a marker."

"What for?"

"The master time dial."

Hobbes blinked. "Say what now?"

Calvin pointed to a crude dial - also of cardboard - fastened to the inside of the front of the Time Machine. "Don't you remember? We never went into the future at all. All the time periods for the dial to turn to are in the past."

It was true. At the top and center was the word 'Present'. To the left were a few numbers for times in the distant past...but to the _right_ of the dial was only blank brown cardboard.

"Ah. We can't travel to a time that isn't written there?"

"Not with this Time Machine. I'll try and fix that someday, but this'll work just fine for now." Quickly boosting himself over the side, Calvin quickly scrawled "2100 AD" in an appropriate spot.

"Okay. Are the handles still here?" Calvin glanced at the sides of the box. The 'hold on' handles, carved from scrap plastic and securely stapled to the sides, were indeed still there. So was the Boy Scout compass taped to the front. _And_ the cheap watch with the cracked face - to help them get home at the exact same time.

"Yeah! Dad didn't take anything off it! Get in and we can go to the future right now!"

Hobbes carefully boarded the Time Machine and sat down in the back. The box was spacious enough for the both of them and leg room to spare.

"Goggles on!" The two each put on their 'vortex goggles', old welding goggles Calvin had found in a junkyard long ago.

Calvin eagerly turned the dial to the future date and gripped the front edge of the box. "Here we go!"

Nothing happened.

"Whoops...heh, heh...it's been awhile." He leaned forward and stared into the distance.

Still nothing. A gentle breeze rustled the leaves on a nearby bush.

"Gee whiz! I'm **really** out of practice!" Calvin shut his eyes tight and concentrated hard.

Suddenly the Time Machine began to wobble as if caught in an earthquake. After a second or two of violent spasms it shot up like a bottle rocket and hovered in midair! A startled Hobbes dug his claws deep into the cardboard.

"Yes! Yes! _Yes!_"

Seemingly powered by nothing at all, the box rose higher and higher, then pointed it's flat nose up and shot forward with a lurch. Soon the Time Machine was tearing through the skies above Calvin's home street.

Hobbes peeked over the side to admire the view from five stories up. He didn't look long before Calvin elbowed him firmly. "Eyes front, pal! We're gonna make the jump in a second!" Nodding in acknowledgment Hobbes turned forward again.

A moment later something appeared in the sky ahead...a black, swirling vortex that came out of nowhere. It looked somehow 'flat' - as though a paper cutout had been pasted into a three-dimensional world.

_Ah yes. __This__ part._

The Time Machine hurtled toward the hole in the atmosphere. _With a swooosh_ heard only by the time travelers themselves, the box and it's passengers vanished into thin air.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three

"Dodge City"

At first there was no movement from the Time Machine. Then slowly, carefully, a striped head poked over the side.

"Nice flying," croaked Hobbes.

"Thanks. Next time I'll do a barrel roll for your pleasure."

"Don't you dare. Oh my aching paws..."

"Paws? I smashed my butt! Hard!"

"Oh you poor baby," Hobbes mocked, "shall I kiss it better?"

_I oughta give you what-for..._But at the moment all Calvin could do was shoot a dirty look and painfully clamber out of the box. He stood up stiffly and rubbed the seat of his pants with one hand. "Oh-kay. Now where are we?"

The two time travelers looked around. In the immediate area were exits into several buildings. Most were rusty-red with at least one steel chimney. The walkway itself ended behind them by leading into a building, while the other end went on for quite some distance.

After examining at several of the buildings, Hobbes spoke up. "We're in some kind of industrial area. All the big buildings I see look sort of like ones at home that were factories or things like that."

Calvin edged close to the clear panels at the edge of the walkway. "Whoa! We're also high up. _Really_high up."

Hobbes took one look and his tail frizzed out. "Heavens. A hundred stories at _least_. Maybe more."

Calvin spent a moment staring down at the ground below before he remembered something. "The Time Machine! How bad is it?" He rushed over and lifted up one side to survey the damage...

"Uh oh."

"Bad?" With a leap Hobbes was there beside him .

The bottom of the box was badly scraped up. Much of the outer layer had been torn away by the long skid along the walkway. In places the inner layer of folded cardboard showed through.

"Whoo. That looks pretty bad."

"_Tell_ me about it. Just be glad this is an extra-sturdy box."

"We sure won't be able to do another landing like that, Calvin."

"I know, I know! So that means we'd better make this trip count. Here - let's find someplace to hide the Time Machine."

"What about **that**?" Hobbes pointed to the trail of brown flecks on the ground. "Even a one-eyed old lady could see the mess we made!"

"Unless you brought a broom, there's nothing we can do about that. But you, me and the machine had better be out of sight before somebody -"

At that moment a large green vehicle appeared from behind one of the buildings.

"_Duck!_" The two hid behind the Time Machine. But the ponderous craft simply flew high over the walkway, to an unknown destination in the city.

Calvin was the first to peek out. "Hope nobody saw us..."

"Oh, somebody saw us, allright. Maybe not on that flying whatever-it-was, but I highly doubt our crazy flight went unnoticed."

Both of them began looking around for a concealed area. But suitable hiding places seemed to be in short supply.

"What's down those stairs?" Calvin indicated a metal staircase.

"Don't ask me. Shall we go look?"

"We'd better." A nervous young boy scanned the walkway for approaching people.

Dragging the box behind them, the intrepid duo cautiously approached a blank metal door at the bottom of the stairs. When they'd gotten within a few feet - the door suddenly slid open!

Calvin froze, expecting a policeman or security robot. But only a dark room lay beyond, illuminated by a reddish light.

"Whew. Just an electric-eye door like at Wal-Mart."

His tiger friend sniffed the air. "I smell fire...like a furnace or something."

"Think we should go in?"

"I don't like it. But we need a place out of sight. Let's check it -carefully."

Leaving the Time Machine on the landing behind them, the two cautiously tiptoed inside. The door slid shut behind them with a soft groan.

Hobbes' feline eyes adjusted to the darkness first. The glow was indeed coming from a furnace. Dust- and rust- colored pipes of all sizes twisted alongside the walls. Ominous hissing and crackling issued from the furnace brooding on the opposite end of the room. An elevator shaft ran up to another floor, the area around it protected only by a thin railing.. Everything was lit in a fiery-red color.

"Creepy." Calvin whispered. "The monsters under my bed would love this place."

His friend didn't comment, instead looking into the darker places. But none of the shadows suddenly moved or jumped at them. After a minute he nodded. "Nobody here but us. Let's get the Time Machine."

"What?!"

"Look around. There's no lights or windows. And the floor hasn't been cleaned in ages."

"So it's a dark, dirty, scary place...so what?"

"Nobody's come around here for a long time, frazzle-hair, and that makes it..."

The light went on in Calvin's head. "The perfect place to hide the Time Machine!"

"_Give_ the man a silver dollar."

Soon the scraped-up Time Machine was tucked away in the most obscure corner in the room. Their machine suitably hidden, the pair ventured back up the metal staircase.

As they got to the top Hobbes began put a finger to his lips and began walking on tiptoe. Both of them made their way to the very last step and poked their heads around the corner.

"Nobody this way."

"All clear on the left."

Calvin stepped out and looked both ways. "I expected the future to be full of people!"

"This is a lucky break for us. We need to get moving."

"Agreed. So where to, buddy?"

"Somewhere besides here."

Calvin glanced around at the different buildings. "How abouuut...that one?"

"Not a chance! See the chimneys on top? And all the steam coming out? That's a factory! Plenty of people there."

"What about this one?"

"We just came out of that building."

"No,**no**, there's gotta be more to it. A recycling plant has more than one dirty room ol' furnace room," Calvin protested. "It's way too big to...to..."

"To what?"

A huge grin spread over the young boy's face. "Hey Hobbes...where do people throw stuff away?"

"In a garbage can?"

"Stuff like batteries and computers."

"Oh - those? Those have to go to a..." Hobbes froze in mid-sentence. "_What_ did you say that building was?"

Calvin's only answer was start running. "Follow me! We hit the jackpot!"

* * *

"Has it reappeared yet?" 

"Alert scopes are still clear, sir, there's nothing in the air that isn't showing an IFF code. It must have crashed or landed by now."

"Last known location was in the industrial zone?"

"Affirmative. Sector A5. Right over a top-level walkway."

"_Really_ now?"

"Right on top of it, sir! The tracking path I saw looked like it was going to land there."

"Interesting!"

"Our response, sir?"

"Contact city security and have them send a squad to that area. Priority four. From what you and Ensign Donnegan told me, that is _awfully _strange behavior for a glitch."

"Yes** sir**...alert sent...city security acknowledges...dispatching three flyers...now."


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter Four "One man's trash..."

Calvin and Hobbes stood in front of another door with 'Main Entrance' printed on it.

"Aha - the front door. Much better way to get in."

"Careful, Calvin..." Hobbes' ears detected strange noises from inside.

The door slid open noiselessly as Calvin approached. He scampered through and stopped, but saw no one.. "All clear!"

Hobbes stepped inside. The interior of the building was spacious. Whirring machinery somewhere high up echoed throughout the room, and some large machines lined the wall to the left.

Something painted on the floor attracted Calvin's attention. "Hey, look at those stripes. They look like the colors on a bee."

"Say what?" Hobbes looked. The stripes were the black-and-yellow warning pattern. "Hmm. Seems like a few things are the same in the future!"

"We had those in our time?"

"Yes...they're used to mark off a dangerous area. This looks like a path for something that goes between that tiny elevator in the floor - " Hobbes pointed to a green panel "- and that other room."

"Wow. Good thinking, pal."

"Why thank you."

With that the two started searching for something interesting. But besides a (stopped) metal press there was only a rickety old staircase that neither was eager to explore. They followed the danger line on the floor to the other room.

Calvin hung a hand on the wall and swung around the corner...and let out a whoop.

"_**WAHOO!**_"

His tiger friend came running.

"What? What is it?"

"There! Look over there!"

Hobbes looked. On one side of the room was a _massive_ pile of discarded electronics and machinery, stacked from floor to ceiling.

"Oh yes, yes, _yes!!_Now we just need to pick out something to say we invented! C'mon, start looking!"

With that the young boy dug into the pile like it was Christmas. Hobbes followed him and gazed warily at the monstrous pile. "I'm...not quite sure _what_I'm supposed to look for..."

"Anything. Anything small enough to carry that's in good shape."

"Ah." So informed, Hobbes dug in.

"Hey...isn't this a coffee machine?" Calvin pointed out a piece of equipment.

"It is! I suppose coffee is still around in 2100."

So the search commenced in earnest. The two each dug for anything that looked interesting, calling to each other when they found something.

"Here's some kinda helmet with a crack in it."

"I've got something that looks like a gun, but the barrel's been melted."

"Hey! I found a robot...aw, rats. His head's broke open."

"Yugh. This whatsit is leaking brown gunk."

After ten minutes of searching it soon became apparent that **everything** in the pile was cracked, melted, missing pieces, or just plain useless in some way. The two soon despaired of finding anything to bring back to their own time.

"Calvin...maybe we'd best call it quits. We haven't found anything useful, and I don't think we will."

"Nuts. I think you're right." The young boy sighed heavily and stood up. "Anywhere else to go in this lousy place?"

"There might be."

"Yes or no, hairball-breath."

Hobbes merely indicated a labeled door on the opposite wall. "What's that say?"

It was a long word. "Rec...reck-lah-may-shun. And that means...?"

"It means we had better go look in there."

"If you say so." Calvin walked toward the door.

'Reclamation' was a corridor with filing cabinets and drawers on both sides that went from floor to short ceiling. Every one of them had a clear front panel and was sported a small but readable printed label.

Calvin took one look and went bug-eyed. "Fuel cells...laser units...vibro-blades...hoverboard parts...oh wow _oh wow! _This is a treasure trove!"

"Sure looks that way! My guess is that whoever works here takes out the usable parts from all the junk and stores them in here."

"Pretty convenient for us, huh? Solar panels...nanobot bays...microblades...Hobbes, this is like being in Santa's toy store! All I have to do is pick something!"

"So pick something."

"I will. Here - 'laser generation arrays'. Sounds good to me." With that he grasped the molded handle and pulled.

Nothing.

"Hey! What the...allright then - heave!!"

The drawer didn't budge.

Calvin broke out in a string of words he'd heard his dad use to describe taxes. All that did was to make Hobbes' tail curl in shock.

"Um...might I point out the drawers are locked?" Hobbes pointed to a card scanner on the

top of each shelf.

"Locked?! Darn! Let's keep looking!"

Soon they turned a corner and spied a bulky steel desk. Calvin personally inspected every drawer and found little of importance except a bag full of chocolate-tasting candy, which he took the liberty of sampling. But the keycard was nowhere to be found.

Finally Calvin gave up hope. "This is a waste of time. We should go somewhere else; the stuff in those drawers might as well be on Mars."

The two retraced their steps and were soon standing outside again.

"So what now, old buddy?"

"Maybe go to another recycling plant? I dunno...where's someplace else we can get our hands on some future gadgets?"

"A better question might be where are _we?_" Hobbes examined the horizon critically. "This city goes on formiles and we haven't got so much as a roadmap!"

"Ooh. Good point." This made Calvin stop and think. "Well...mom got some maps at the gas station one time."

"See any gas stations around?"

"Sure! Right over..." Calvin immediately looked around for one. But there wasn't anything in sight that even remotely resembled a gas station.

"My point exactly."

"Then how about computers? Dad printed off a map of Seattle when he went there for a business meeting once. There have to be computers in 2100!"

"Sure thing. How about we find one?"

"Sure!" Without a moment's delay the young boy chose a direction and sprinted down the walkway to look for a computer. Hobbes followed, amazed at his friend's eager-but-naive attitude.

First the two ran all around the recycling plant. Then they walked through all the walkways around the building at the end of the walkway. Neither of those places contained a computer, and Calvin decided to check the path behind the factory.

The factory quickly turned out to be longer than it looked. Calvin and Hobbes ended up jogging almost four blocks past rusty back doors, odd-smelling vents and noisy machinery. His eager attitude began to dampen a bit.

Finally the pair sighted an open area just beyond where the factory ended. Recessed into the corner of the building was something resembling an oversized telephone booth with a weatherbeaten sign - "Public Net Access".

"Finally!" Calvin ran up to the door, an old-fashioned one that opened with a handle instead of automatically.

"Ah, this looks promising! Shall we?"

Calvin grinned and pulled open the door. "Let's shall!"

* * *

Inside, the booth was brightly lit by a white light the size of a credit card. It had been painted beige at one time, but faded over countless years. A bench provided the only sitting space.

But the main feature of the booth was an ivory-toned cabinet about four feet high, with a decent-sized screen tilted upward at a sharp angle. It reminded Calvin of a kind of arcade game he'd seen- something grown-ups called 'cabarets'.

"Wow. So this must be a futuristic computer!"

Hobbes looked skeptical. "_Maybe._ Look at this." He pointed to a squarish keypad. It had the numbers 1-9, the and the # keys in fancy lettering. Except for lacking letters on the inividual keys it resembled a telephone keypad in every way.

"You mean this is a _telephone booth_?"

"Only with video _and_ sound both instead of just sound. Is it really so surprising? Just look at this place from the outside."

Calvin scowled. "One way to find out!" With that he reached up and pressed a button at random.

In response the screen brightened up to a light grey.

"Hmm! I think it's on screensaver!"

Calvin hit another button and suddenly the machine displayed green text on a black background.

**Indicate Node Usage**

**1---Livefeed® Communication**

**2---Data access**

The young boy stopped in his tracks. "Uhh…Hobbes? What now?"

"Let me see." Hobbes thought for a moment. "I think it wants you to pick which way to use it - as a telephone or as a computer. I _think._"

"Then we want number 2." Without delay Calvin reached up and pushed 2.

A soft 'chirp' sounded , and the screen changed again.

Insert access card, enter login, or choose '1' for Guest usage.

"I guess we'll be guests." _Cha-reep._

Once again the screen changed - but this time it displayed a pretty blue banner. On a previously blank part of the console a keyboard appeared, seemingly drawn in a crisp red beam.

"Welcome to Unionopolis Network...Logged into CLWAN-A1-C102. Whatever that means."

"Probably the name of the computer we're on."

"Eh. Some name. Here, help me figure out this big thingy."

On the top of the screen was a blank grey bar. There was one along the bottom with a few strange pictures running from left to right. In the center of the screen was displayed a large hexagonal something-or-other labeled 'Hexecute', with brilliantly colored groups of icons along each of the sides. Hobbes studied them intently.

"There - that one. The icon under 'Connect!'."

"Which? The pair of talking yellow smiley faces?"

"Nonono. See that thing that looks like a pouncing dog? It's labeled 'NetSurf - Lupine Browser'."

"That's not a dog, that's a fox."

"Ehh, all canines look alike to me. Try that one."

Calvin looked about for a mouse. Nothing. But a blue panel along the holographic keyboard seemed much like the 'touchpad' on his dad's laptop. As he touched it, the panel lit up around his finger - and sure enough, the little diamond-shaped cursor started moving!

"Cool! Here we go!"

"Found the 'mouse'? "

"Yeah! Hey buddy, we just figured out something about the future!" An elated Calvin moved the cursor over to the icon and thumped his finger.

_Chak!_

The six-sided figure vanished and was replaced by a rectangular box with a logo of a stylized vixen chasing her own tail. After a few moments another screen appeared, this one looking somewhat like a website in Calvin's own time.

"Whoa! Now what?"

"Just wait a minute and let it finish. Maybe something will happen."

They waited. Sure enough - a cute but incredibly detailed robot appeared out of nowhere.

"_**Hello there! Welcome to the Lupine network browser!" **_

"Wow!"

"It talks!"

"_**Would you my help?" **_A green check and a red X appeared over his head.

Without hesitation Calvin clicked the check. "Darn right I do."

The robot smiled excitedly and clapped it's metallic hands. _**"I will try my best to be helpful to you. Now then - what take would you like to accomplish?"**_

Multiple 'thought balloons' popped into existence and hovered near the robot. One of them said 'find something', and Hobbes pointed a furry finger at it. "That one. We want to find something."

_Cheep!_

"_**Okay. What would you like to find?" **_More thought balloons; labeled everything from 'business' to 'information' to 'maps.' _Maps? Bingo!_

A blue cloud enveloped the robot. He reappeared wearing the regalia of Sherlock Holmes and smoking a pipe in his mouth. Both time travelers laughed at the comical sight.

"_**Very well then sir. Please enter what sort of map you're hoping to find, please." **_

"Good grief, what a corny accent."

Calvin reached for the keyboard, but his hands stopped in midair. "Hey! What's going on? All they keys are switched around!" It was true. The layout was nothing like the one on his parents' computer.

Hobbes looked. "Odd. Wonder why they did that? At least there's still English in the future."

It took the young boy several minutes to hunt and peck out 'a map of where we are'.

The onscreen helper raised an eyebrow. _**"Are you asking for a map of your current location?" **_Again the check and the X.

When Calvin selected 'yes', the robot pulled a piece of paper out of thin air and began reading it. _**"Just a moment please." **_

A few seconds later it looked back up. _**"Your location has been detected as Manufacturing Zone, Level A, Section 1 . If you want I can: 1- upload a local map to your personal data drive. I can also: 2- give you a hardcopy version at no cost, courtesy of The Finder Corporation." **_

"Oh boy." Calvin looked to his friend. "What do we do?"

"We obviously don't have a 'personal data drive' - whatever _that_ is. Option number two sounds like getting a printed map, which would be a very good thing."

Calvin typed the number two on the keyboard...but there was no response.

"Try the keypad."

Calvin pressed two. This produced a message on the top grey bar and a soft whining noise from somewhere within the computer.

" 'Hardcopy generator activating.' What the heck is _that?_"

On cue, whirring sounds suddenly emanated from the left side of the cabinet. Suddenly a panel slid open to reveal several sheets of paper. Calvin grabbed them, and once his hand was clear the panel slid shut again.

"Rather convenient."

"I'll say. Hey, this paper is weird."

" 'Weird' how?"

Calvin ruffled a few of the pages. "It feels like…money!"

"Let me see." Hobbes plucked a page from Calvin's hand. The paper was colored a faint blue instead of bleached white. And it did indeed feel like paper money in their time: flexible, easily folded and creased, but with that certain subtle feeling of cloth to it.

"Odd. Looks like money. Feels like money." Hobbes sniffed it. "Doesn't smell like money. Isn't printed like money, either. I wonder why paper is printed like _this_ in the future?"

Calvin shrugged. "Who cares? Now we have a map, let's find out where we are." He read the title of the first page in his hand. "The computer said we were in the manu-fact-uring Zone. So what's that?"

"It sounds like another name for a part of a city where the big smokey factories are. **Not** a nice place to stay; there's a lot of racket and pollution."

"Okay. But where _do_ we go?"

Hobbes thought. "You want to find something new that wasn't invented in our own time. Am I correct?"

"Right."

"Well, to do that we need information on how to make one of that something."

Calvin blinked. "What? _Information?!_ Dad once said someone needs to a 'working model' of something to claim they invented it. All we need to do is swipe something already made and bring it back."

"You obviously weren't listening to your dad very carefully. So what if you found some super kind of gadget and _did_ take it home? Could you explain to anybody how it worked?"

"Uh…well…I...er..." Calvin looked at the floor. "Drat. I guess not."

"Getting a thing is only half of the battle. We need to know _how it works! _Otherwise you can't tell how you 'invented' it."

"I guess you're right. Thanks Hobbes. So where do we find information? A lot of information."

"If you were at home, what places would you go to learn about something?"

Calvin wrinkled his nose. "_School?_ We have to go to future school?"

"Hardly. Think of it this way - you like dinosaurs, right?"

"You bet!"

"Allright then, what places would you go to learn about dinosaurs?"

The young boy looked upwards and thought out loud. "Well…I guess at a museum…or maybe…" Suddenly his face lit up. "The library!"

"Givvve the man a silver dollar! The library has tons of books and more information than we could ever need or read. Plus it's quiet and hopefully not very busy."

"If there still _is_ a library." A doubtful Calvin began shuffling through the sheaf of papers. "I kinda think that by now everyone's reading everything on computers."

Now it was Hobbes' turn to pause and reflect. "Ooh. Good point."

"We could ask the computer again." Calvin indicated the terminal, its screen again a blank grey.

"I don't see why not. As long as we ask for directions to get there and back."

"Here, lemme at it!" Calvin shoved an armful of papers into his tiger friend's paws and reached up to the keyboard.

Before he touched a single key, Hobbes suddenly stiffened. "Wait!"

Calvin froze. Off in the distance he could just hear the sound of some kind of engine. "Hey - that sounds kinda like a jet!"

Hobbes nodded. The noise was much like a jet engine, but lower pitched and not nearly so loud. "Sounds like a couple engines now…no. Three. Maybe more."

The sounds began growing louder. Soon Hobbes could distinguish four separate engines. A nervous Calvin bounded away from the machine and stood on the bench. Both of them began watching.

In a moment four black-and-silver vehicles appeared from around a tall building.

Calvin gulped. "C-c-cop cars!"

Hobbes' tail frizzed. They did look much like police cars in their own time, minus any wheels and with far sleeker bodies.

"Oh bad. They're coming this way."

The foursome veered off to their right and headed for the open space.

"Where are they going, Hobbes? What're they doing?"

"Landing," the tiger replied grimly. "See those lighted panels over there? Watch. A dollar says they land right on top of them."

His prediction was dead on. Flying in perfect formation, the flying cars slowed to a stop over four of the six illuminated landing spots. As a single unit they lowered themselves to hover only a couple feet above the ground.

"Impressive flying," Hobbes mused.

Before their engines even finished winding down, doors began opening, folding over the top of the roofs in a complex and impressive manner. Heavyset figures clad in black-and-silver body armor disembarked from the vehicles - eight of them in all.

Calvin and Hobbes watched as the group of futuristic police began conferring amongst themselves. One finally stepped back and indicated the others two at a time. At each stab of the fingers two stern-faced policemen split off and began running. Three groups ran down the opposite side of the building…but the fourth group began heading down the back path.

Right towards them.

"Hobbes, I think we're in trouble!"


	5. Chapter 5

A terrified Calvin watched as the two figures strode purposefully toward him.

"Hobbes! What do we do?"

The tiger quickly sized up the situation; there weren't many options and the policemen were marching double-time. They had about thirty seconds before they were spotted for sure. Running was out of the question. If the police in 2100 were still even half-decent, they wouldn't stand a chance in a foot race. All that was left to do was hide in or under something. Nothing to hide _in_ here. But the bench had a hollow space underneath. Far too small for an adult, but not for a young kid

"Calvin, take the papers and get under the seat, then help me get under there. Hurry!" Hobbes shoved the printed papers into his companion's hands.

Calvin looked anxiously at the approaching police. "But what about you, Hobbes?" He looked back at his companion. "How will you fit under - oh."

His tiger friend had reverted to his stuffed-animal form. Instead of a six-foot anthromorphic tiger, he was now a foot-and-a-half tall plushie with stitches for a mouth and black buttons for eyes.

Calvin shoved the printouts under one corner of the bench and took Hobbes under one arm. In a flash he'd crawled under the opposite corner of the bench, as far back from the door as he could get. He scrunched back as much as humanly possible until cold metal pressed against his spine.

The _trimp-tramp, trimp-tramp _of booted feet was getting close. Huddled in that little space, Calvin had time to think _this wasn't what I expected to be doing in the future._

Then they were there.

Overwatch Officer Level 5 David Romsfeld kept his eyes locked on the approaching corner. There was something funny in this area and it was his job to find '_it'_ - if _'it'_ didn't find _him_ first. "Watch out for anything unusual," he'd been told by the Level 1 himself, Commander Rabin. "A citizen with a warrant out, an alien, even some loose kid out on a little ride."

At least he knew the last one was impossible. _Kid. Yeah right. What kind of kid pops out of nowhere on the scanners?_

Officer Shelsky and he reached the corner. Shelsky withdrew his two Talon handguns and looked to his partner. David nodded - a blind corner and an unknown _something_ in the area made for a dangerous combination. He snapped the safety off his own weapon, a laser pistol. They both stepped around the corner at lightning speed as a single person.

The alley was deserted.

Shelsky relaxed a little. He gave a cursory glance inside the 'net booth set into the corner of the building. It was empty and the screen was blank. "Looks like _it_ isn't around here at any rate."

But Officer David shook his head. "Don't be too sure. There's a million objects to do some scaling on - and this factory has a flat roof."

"What's that got to do with...oh...makes it easy to walk on, doesn't it?"

Another nod. "You watch up top."

A wide-eyed Shelsky looked upwards with a shiver. "Blind alley, no image recorders, roof like a walkway..."

"One heck of an ambush point, innit? Keep those things up and ready. I'll cover any doors and equipment to make sure _it_ isn't lurking behind something. Cover me."

With that the two officers began moving down the alley at a fast walk. One constantly watched the edge of the roof as the other cautiously eyed odd pieces of equipment and checked numerous back doors. A nearby pressure-relief valve hissed suddenly and was nearly shot by bullets and laser beams from the nervous officers as they continued down the alley in their trained, methodical way.

Calvin slowly poked his head out from under the bench. The sound of boots was gone. But were the police? He looked out the window. Nothing. He got out and looked as far down the alley as possible without opening the door. Still nothing.

"Whew! That was close. I have to get out of here _fast!_" He was sure the police would be back this way. But where to go? Certainly not the way they went. Staying here was risky. Where could he hide?

Behind the police cars?

It was a crazy thought to say the least. But who would look behind their own cars? If he stayed behind them until they started to take off, just perhaps he'd escape notice.

_Why not. _The young boy frantically started dusting himself off. Fortunately there hadn't been any gum (or worse) stuck under the bench. Then he pulled Hobbes out, who looked just fine.

Now what about the papers? There were only seven sheets, but they kept falling apart. Calvin remembered a tip from his mother and started creasing them along the corner - handy when you there wasn't a stapler or paperclip handy.

A single sheet fell to the floor. He ignored it, it just had a little text along the top and no actual map. As slowly as possible Calvin opened the door and held it with one foot.

Taking the papers under one arm and Hobbes under the other, the young boy waited a second to listen...and then dashed out the door like a cheetah on steroids.

Calvin covered the fifty yards to the hovercars in record time. He reached the group and crouched behind the back of the one closest to the railing, panting heavily. A low thrumming sound came from what he assumed was their engines.

For a few seconds he gave the futuristic cars a look-over. They were quite different seeing as he was used to every vehicle having wheels. Besides lacking any wheels at all the underside was covered in lengthwise panels that glowed a golden-red. He stuck a hand underneath and very carefully touched one of them. It felt smoother than linoleum and somewhat warm.

Out of curiosity Calvin gave the bumper a nudge. The car bobbed a little over to the opposite direction, then snapped back like a bent spring.

"Cool."

"I wouldn't do that if I were you."

Calvin whirled around. "Hobbes!" His friend was back in his 'real' form, crouching low beside him.

"Indeed. Calvin...you do remember when your parents talked about installing a car alarm?"

"A little. Why?"

"Because most car alarms go off one of two ways: when a window or door is broken into - or when the car is moved."

Calvin yanked his hand away. "Whoa! Thanks for telling me."

"No problem." Hobbes peered around the right side of the car. "Interesting place you picked to hide. Care to tell me why?"

"Hey! There wasn't anywhere else to go! The police officers went down the alley the other way!"

"And what was wrong with our current location?"

An icy I-don't-know-stare was the only response.

"I see. Well...we're here now. What's the plan, oh fearless leader?"

"I was gonna wait until they started to take off. I bet the police will look everywhere coming back - who'd expect someone to hide here?"

"Listen, frizzletop, these are policemen we're talking about. If they don't notice someone hiding behind their own car then the police in the future are pretty darn lousy."

Calvin squirmed. "Okay! Okay! So maybe this wasn't my best idea. But where do we go now? Back to that booth thingy?"

"That's rather dangerous now. We'd have to run all the way back without anything to hide behind. What about those?"

"Those what?"

Hobbes gestured to something, and Calvin turned to follow his friend's gaze.

In one corner of the runway a small structure protruded from the landing pad, just southwest of where they were currently hiding. Two tube-like openings were set into the front. Each was about six feet tall and backlit in a soft blue light.

"How come I didn't see that before? And what are those?"

"We were looking at it from the side. Nothing but wall from that point of view. As for what they are...look closely. See those shiny thingamabobs inside it?"

Calvin had to squint to see just what Hobbes was talking about. The tube on the right had whitish sparkles floating gently in a downward direction.

"A fairy convention?"

"Funny. See how they all float down? Unless I'm wrong, it's some kind of elevator."

"No way! Elevators have doors and don't do a light show."

"Not in our time. In 2100 they might be a little different."

"A 'little' different? Well...okay...lemme see." Calvin darted over and stood by the edge. At a closer distance the 'sparkles' were much more distinct; like little spiky cotton balls wafting around in thin air. They seemed to appear from everywhere and nowhere at once, bouncing off the smooth walls of the tube as they drifted toward the ground below.

Curious, Calvin carefully stretched out one hand. In a few seconds one of the odd little sprites collided with his outstretched fingers and vanished in a silent puff of white.

"Weird."

"I'll say." Hobbes leaned over and chomped on one. "Rats. Pretty tasteless."

"What were you expecting - tuna fish? How far does this go down?"

Hobbes got down on all fours and _very_ carefully peered over the edge. After a moment he looked up at Calvin. "About a couple stories. I think."

A knot started growing in Calvin's stomach. "How high is a story?"

"Eight to fifteen feet, give or take."

"So that goes down _thirty feet?!_"

"About. It could be more. It's rather hard to tell from here."

Calvin started backing away. "Nuh-uh. I am NOT going down there. No way. You were right about that booth! Let's go back and - "

A loud crash suddenly came from the back alley, followed by yells. Both time travelers froze.

"**Hey!** Back here! I saw something!"

Hobbes' tail frizzled out like a feather duster. "Ah, Calvin, I think we'd better move."

Calvin gulped. _Take a chance on 'elevator' or the police?_ "But what if that thing lets us fall? We'll be pancakes!"

But his friend had already made up his mind. Standing upright, Hobbes leaped into the shaft. He hung there for an instant and began to gently sink down.

"First floor, going dowwwwn! Hurry up Calvin!" Soon he was below the floor level and going downward.

The young boy hesitated. It looked safe enough...but

More yells. Sounds of running feet. "There! Over there! Hey - DON'T MOVE!!!"

He jumped.

Officer David swore and struggled to get to his feet. "A _'coon!_ A &$# _racoon!_ Where the #&# did that come from?! There isn't supposed to be one of those $&$# trash-scavengers in this whole &!# _city!_"

His partner helped him stand. "I guess Vector Control missed that one. You get to tell the factory manager how those holes in that cooling unit got there."

The infuriated officer retrieved his weapon and swore a blue streak at the raccon and all his recent ancestors. "I don't care. #$ thing gave me a heart attack!" Dusting off his uniform he took off down the alley like a maddened bull. "Let's go! The rest of the squad's waiting!"

"Blaaahaaahaieeee!"

The young boy felt himself falling...falling...falling through thin air with hundreds of the white sparkles all around. Frantically he tried to grab onto the walls, but they were slicker than ice.

Suddenly a familiar voice boomed from below. "Hey! Relax!"

Calvin stopped panicking for a moment. "H-Hobbes?!"

"Below you! Take it easy! We're not free-falling. Look down here at me."

Hobbes was floating in the blue nothingness, stretched out in a relaxed upright position. "See? Just relax! Act like you're in the hammock at home."

A skeptical young boy stopped waving his arms and feet. His friend was right. They were drifting down at a measured rate. Slowly he let his arm muscles relax. They floated in midair beside him, their weight borne by some unknown force. "Whoa. That's kinda neat!"

"Relaxing, too." Hobbes stretched his hind legs and let himself go limp in the weightless environment.

Calvin watched the entrance recede farther and farther above them. Sparkles whirled and dived all around his face. He tried catching one on his tongue like a snowflake. Hobbes had been right. They really were tasteless; except for a mild metallic sensation like when you licked a nine-volt battery.

The pair drifted gently on down the shaft without further comment - until Hobbes happened to notice how close the bottom was coming up. "Whoa! Heads up! Get ready to stand up again!"

Again a brief panic. "Uh-oh! Hobbes...I'm gonna land right on top of you!"

"No worries. I'll catch ya."

In another instant padded feline feet hit the floor almost soundlessly. Hobbes held his paws up and braced for the impact. But it never came. Curiously, Calvin stayed suspended in the air, the bottoms of his shoes three feet above his friend's outstretched paws. He waited...but Calvin just stayed there. Calvin was both relieved and worried at the same time. "What's wrong? Why can't I come down?"

It was indeed strange, but the clever tiger soon figured it out. "I get it! Next person in line doesn't come down until the way is clear so they don't get smashed."

"So this is a safety system?" asked the floating boy.

"I bet so." So saying Hobbes scampered out of the shaft. And no sooner had he done so than his friend came floating down to a perfect two-point landing.

"Whew. First I think I'm gonna go 'splat', and _then_ I think I'm stuck! What a way to travel."

The two took a while to survey their surroundings. Chipped and faded block lettering on the wall indicated they had just ridden in a 'gravshaft' , which had deposited them in a dimly-lit alcove. Four dented old benches lined opposite ends of the walls. After seeing nothing of any interest they followed the walkway out.

As they came into broad daylight an incredible sight met their eyes. Calvin's eyes went as wide as saucers. Hobbes' tail did another impression of a dust broom.

"Good heavens!"

"It's...huge!!!"

They had emerged onto a very large walkway with tall clear panels lining the sides. It behaved like some kind of mutant tree; twisting and turning around things and branching off into new paths too many times to count.

And the buildings...

Until now Calvin hadn't quite noticed just how large the buildings were. Now instead of seeing them from the top down he and Hobbes on an 'eye-level' with the structures of 2100. They weren't just 'big' but also jaw-dropping _tall._

"Wow-ee! Look up there! That's where we just were!"

Hobbes looked upwards and gasped. "Oh...my...I take back my statement. We're not a 'couple' stories down! We're more like five stories down!" From where he and Calvin were standing, looking up and back in the direction of the alcove they could see the platform. It looked quite small.

This made him curious. "So then how far up are we now?" He pulled himself on the top of the panels and peered over them. "Oh good heavens...don't look down, Calvin. It's a **long** way to the ground from here."

Calvin looked down through the clear panels and instantly got a bad case of vertigo. "Oog. Good thing these glass panels are here."

"Don't think these are old-fashioned glass, but yes, I'm very happy they're here."

"Nice view anyway."

"Oh yes."

Several minutes passed while each surveyed a separate part of the city. Calvin looked at the different buildings, uniformly colored in a neutral ivory-beige paint. Hobbes observed the many kinds of flying vehicles flitting among the cityscape like birds in a forest. Some came close enough for a cursory visual inspection, and he noted a few common traits among them.

Finally Calvin broke the silence. "So what now?"

"I suppose we had better look at that map." Hobbes sat down cross-legged to get down to his friend's level as Calvin produced the printed map. "So which page are we on?"

"This one. See? It says 'you are here' and has a red X."

"Nonono. That's where we just were. Look."

"_Oh - _I see! That was at the booth."

"Precisely. We're one level below that. The 'you are here' message refers to where the map was made."

"Boy do I feel dumb." Calvin turned the page. "Okay. 'Level 6'. Now what is there on level six?" The pair studied the map.

"Transportation center...light commercial area...'Class-E residential'?"

"Housing of some sort."

"Oh. There sure is a lot of it."

"Probably for the industrial workers. Hmm. I see a few 'detox centers'. Another light commercial area...and a nice-sized food court. That's about it."

Calvin's ears perked up. "A food court?! Like in a mall? Cool! I wanna go there and see some food from the future! How do we get there?"

"Go straight down from here, take a left at _this_ corner and all the way past there...and one more left and straight as the crow flies. By the way - do you have any way to pay for it?"

"Pay? Aw nuts, that's right. I'm almost broke as it is."

"I was wondering if you'd remember that."

Calvin scowled. "Allright already smart guy. So where else is there to go?"

Hobbes studied the map again and twitched his whiskers. "It _appears_ there isn't much else. Those places called 'light commercial' are stores of one kind or another and we certainly don't live here. That cancels out all those housing places. What's on the level below us?"

Level Five was even less interesting. The layout of the walkways and areas were far more organized, but there was little that any time-traveler would care to visit.

"Class D housing, tons of 'cyberbusiness' sectiond, and a bazillion of these little G's in squares."

"Say what?"

"Look. There are all those little rounded-edge-square-thingamabobs that have big G's and there's nothing that says what they are."

Hobbes squinted at the smallish symbols. The rectangular boxes had a letter G with subscript lettering. And there indeed was no map key anywhere. _How about if... _He flipped the page over. Sure enough, printed on the back was a list running down the middle. "Aha! Says these are 'replicators'. 'Fr' means 'food rations', 'cp' is 'consumer product', 'p' is 'personal products' and 'l' is 'luxury'."

"So what does **that** all mean?"

"I haven't got the foggiest idea."

A frustrated Calvin began madly skimming the pages for something that sounded relevant to his little mission. Finally, on the north side of Level Three, he spotted a building with a very interesting label. " 'National VR Historical Archive'. There! That's about history! And what's 'history' in 2100 will be our time now!"

Carefully Hobbes considered the words in the name. "Historical...history...that and archive...Calvin, I think that is indeed what we're looking for! Good eyes!"

"Great! Now how do we get from here to there?"

"Simple enough. There's an elevator over...here. And down by the food court there's four spaces that look like escalators. Which way do we go?"

In all of 1.3 seconds Calvin decided. "Let's go to the food court. It goes the same way and I wanna at least see what food is like in the future while I'm at it."

"Then that's the way we'll go."

Without further ado they started off. Hobbes walked behind as Calvin led the way with the map in hand and an excited grin on his face. So what about those pesky police? They'd snuck past them and were free to go wherever they good and well pleased. He was on the start of a great adventure!


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6 "First Contact"

The time-traveling duo had gone halfway to the food court when Calvin spied something interesting. Sticking out of a short ceramic barrel was the handle of something that looked useful.

Naturally, Calvin just _had_ to investigate. He ran over and looked in. "Hey Hobbes! Look at this!"

"What do we have here?" Hobbes reached over and looked in. It seemed to be attached to something that looked remarkably like...

"A backpack! Cool!"

To Hobbes' surprise it did indeed look like a backpack. "How interesting. Looks like this mode of carrying things is still seen as useful."

"Take it outta there and put it on the ground," Calvin pleaded. His friend did so - whereupon they found it was bigger than it appeared. "My! Not one of those dinky kiddy-packs."

"Yeah! And look at all these things on the outside!"

The exterior of the backpack had more bells and whistles than a kindergarten orchestra. There were expandable-mesh pockets, long and thin pockets, hook and D-ring straps, and flaps with all manner of strange symbols.

"This looks expensive," observed Calvin. He ran a finger along the 'cloth'. It felt as tough as steel. "Heck - it even _feels_ expensive."

Hobbes felt it. "Ooh. Seconded. Try it on for size."

Calvin went to put on the backpack and discovered it had four straps. There were the usual two that came up from under your arms plus two more: one that went around your chest and another around your waist. That wouldn't have been a problem, except that on Calvin's short frame they now went around his stomach and just below his knees.

"Uhh, Hobbes? A little help here? I can't even walk with this thing on!"

"Let's see what we can do about that..." He discovered that the crossways straps could be moved up or down by press-and-hold alligator clips. Hobbes attached it higher up on the shoulder straps, repeating the performance for the bottom one. "There now. How's it feel?"

"It feels okay...but...I think I see why this got thrown away, Hobbes." Calvin pointed to the left shoulder strap. It had snapped right in the middle. And for that matter - so had the other side!

"Bother." Hobbes examined the frayed ends. "And us without needle and thread. Now what?"

"Wait!" Calvin's face lit up. "Didn't dad know some kind of knot for this? I saw him tie up a broken fishing line once. Here, lemme see that."

Between Calvin's memory and Hobbes' skillful tying the two managed to repair the backpack. The straps were secured with serviceable fisherman's knots, and although Calvin looked rather odd with such a huge backpack, it was wearable. He stuffed the map into one of the many pockets - minus the page that showed their level.

"Okay...now where were we going? Oh yeah. The food court. C'mon!"

"Wait a second. Might it be wise for me to...ah...change forms before we run into people? We've been very lucky so far, but I highly doubt that we will be the only ones at a future cafeteria."

"Point. Go ahead, I'll carry you in my backpack."

Hobbes closed his eyes and let his front paws fall limply by his side. Before you could even see it happening, he was back in his stuffed-tiger form, sitting mutely on the sidewalk. Calvin carefully placed him in one of the larger compartments and set off at a brisk walk.

The path itself was fairly straightforward. Soon Calvin saw several pairs of brilliantly colored 'signs' above the walkway. He noticed that in 2100 rotating signs were still used for outdoor advertising - except that they floated in thin air between two thin metal rods.

But signs weren't all he saw - there were people! _About time..._ From where he was Calvin could only see that many wore incredibly different kinds of brightly colored clothing. He heard the babble of distant voices that signaled a fair-sized crowd.

Calvin read the signs out of curiosity, even though their meanings were totally lost on him. 'ONLY ValuWrap vending machines used here!' 'All food products molecularly certified!' "Huh...I wonder what that all means?"

Not far ahead a sort of entranceway was formed by two pillars along either side of the walkway. As Calvin approached it, a pleasant blue glow came from the pillars and a melodious _'bing!' _sounded.

A sudden bout of uncertainty gripped him. All those strange people...how did they talk? Was English still the spoken language? Were people in the future mostly nice?

For a few seconds the young time traveler simply stood at the threshold. Half of him wanted to turn and run. But the other half whispered to go on and see the sights and watch how people acted.

Finally he decided the internal debate. Calling on all the five-year-old courage he had, Calvin put on a smile and stepped through the entrance and into the crowd.

The interior of the food court was shaped like a large twelve-sided cylinder. Four sides were open entrances, including the one Calvin had just entered. The rest were divided into upper and lower halves. The lower half was dedicated to what looked to be vending machines grouped by what was in them. Above them were dozens of advertisments for a myriad of goods, none of which were familiar to Calvin.

As for the people, their speech _sounded _like English, but the vocabulary of 2100 seemed a little different. Pronunciation was different as well. Clothing seemed a tad different from Calvin's time: separate shirts and pants seemed to not be 'in' for the large part. Most wore some kind of jumpsuit colored a shade of green or red. All seemed to be wearing a thick silver armband - what they were for Calvin couldn't guess.

Calvin suddenly realized he was standing in the middle of the street and had the presence of mind to step out of the way while he continued to observe.

_Gosh...what do I want to learn about?_ Normally he would have gagged at the thought of actually _**learning**_ something. But Hobbes had once told him that 'if no one _makes _you learn, it counts as fun.' Calvin had taken those words to heart.

There was so much to look at! And so much to hear! Finally he decided to stand next to one of the machines and observe as he pretended to read his map. And that was exactly what the young boy did.

In short order a red-suited man in his mid-20's appeared out of the crowd and looked at the gigantic screen on the front side of the machine. After looking for a moment he pulled up glanced at the whatever-it-was strapped on his forearm.

Instantly his face contorted into a snarl. "_Blix!_ Not enough!" Quickly he looked at something else on the screen and checked his arm again.

"_**Glitching**__ blix! __**Still **_not enough! I hate that pincher! He never gives me back the chips I loan him!" Looking disappointed and angry the young man stalked off, muttering "can' even get a nutri-bar now..."

Calvin tried to decipher what he'd just seen and heard. His best guess was that someone had not returned money the man had loaned out. Words like 'glitching' and 'blix' sounded like futuristic swear words. The young time traveler made a mental note not to say either of them.

Someone else came up to the machine, this time a much older man sporting a pine-green jumpsuit. He calmly looked at the front of the machine and reached for his armband. With only a cursory glance he tapped out several buttons on a small keypad.

_Huh. Must be like practicing typing on dad's computer...you know where the keys are without looking._

A few seconds after the last number was typed a soft chirp came from the armband. The man opened a panel on the top and dumped several small square objects into his left hand. Calvin peeked around the corner and watched as he gingerly inserted them into a slot.

_What are those things? Coins?_ _And why are they all __square?_

When all the 'coins' were inserted the man tapped a picture of something small and rectangular and purple. A muffled sizzling sound came from within the machine, followed by a _thunk_. On hearing this the man bent over and reached into a bin sticking out from the bottom. He pulled out something and walked away, fiddling with the wrapping on the item.

By now Calvin was more than curious. The machine he stood by was obviously some kind of vending machine - but what did it sell?

Replacing the map page in his backpack, Calvin leaned around the edge of the machine to get a look.

The first noticeable thing was an enormous 'screen' at least as tall as he was. It was divided into sections that moved ever-downward and vanished offscreen. Calvin watched long enough to notice the same things eventually came around again. _I get it! That shows what you can buy here!_

Eight items were displayed in all, but most had no description or explanation other than their picture. About the only 'text' anywhere was a series of strange symbols on the leftmost parts of the separate sections. Calvin touched one of them to try and trace the patterns with his finger. At once the pictures stopped moving, and the one he was touching flashed a gentle white.

A closer look revealed the symbols were in fact _shapes _spaced like letters. The ones by the thing he'd touched were a white circle, a white vertical line beside a red vertical line, and a multi-colored triangle. As Calvin studied them closer, a hand suddenly gripped his shoulder!

* * *

Calvin froze like a statue. _**Uh-**__oh! _He quickly glanced back over his shoulder, fully expecting to see a grim-faced policeman.

Instead the young time-traveler looked into the face of a kindly woman. She wore a jumpsuit the color of wintergreen gum and looked about Roslyn's age..

"Hi there!"

"Uh...hi."

"Never glimmed you around here before. What's your tag?"

_So 'glim' isn't a bad word...does she mean my name?_ He assumed she did. "Calvin."

"Anita."

"N-nice to meet you Anita."

She squeezed his shoulder and nodded to the machine. "My glad. You looking for a munchie or two?"

It took Calvin a moment to decipher her words, but he figured it out: she thought he was trying to buy something from the machine.

"Oh! Oh yeah. I thought I had enough...but I forgot to bring any money."

Anita seemed surprised. "This vender isn't expensive - don't you have any chips?"

_So 'chips' are their money, huh? _Calvin shrugged sheepishly and pointed to his backpack. "A million pockets and not a cent in any of them."

A pitying look crossed Anita's face. In a flash she tapped out something on her armband and dumped a small pile of the squarish chips into her other hand, inserting them into the slots like the other people had done.

The machine made the zapping-arcing noise twice, and two objects dropped into the bin below. Anita retrieved them and handed both to Calvin. "Here. Have a couple."

Calvin's eyes boggled. He'd been handed what looked to be two candy bars, each of which was as big as two King-size Snicker's bars side-by-side. "Whoa! These are _huge!_"

Anita smiled. "Don't munch 'em both at once! Here - sit and comm with me for a cycle or two." She sat on a nearby metal bench, and Calvin climbed up beside her.

"So what's a mini like you doing out and around? I thought they didn't dismiss before oh-fifteen-hundred. Or do you have a home-tutor?" Calvin merely nodded. "_Thought _so. The learning centers _never _let you minis out early."

"Yep. My parents don't mind if I go exploring if my homework's done - just as long as I'm home in time for supper. Mom isn't too happy if I try and skip out on whatever she cooks."

Anita's eyes widened. "You still _cook?_ Like with a...stove and all? And soil-grown food?"

"Sure! Well...at least mom does. Dad tried once and he burned everything. You've never seen anyone cook before, Anita?"

At this Anita gasped. "No! Everyone I comm with uses the food replicators or eats prefab meals. I've heard about people who still 'cook' the old-fashioned way, but it takes a lot more equipment."

"Well, I guess so. But mom's pretty good at it unless she cooks something nasty like asparagus."

"Incredible. I wonder what it's like...so what's with your fuzz-top? You get it gelled and set at a hairstyler's? I hear they're 'in' now."

Calvin grasped _that_ question quick enough. "Aw - no. My hair just looks that way by itself. It's not a problem unless I have to go to something dumb like a wedding."

Anita smiled, then looked oddly at him for a moment. "You don't comm like a local at all. Where's your home?"

_Oh boy. Think fast, Calvin._ "It's...a long way off. My parents let me go exploring by myself."

"Well, you must be quite the explorer then! The closest living quarters are, what, two levels at least."

Calvin feigned indifference. "Aww, pfft. That's nothing. I walk lots of places. I mean, we _have_ a hovercar, but I like to walk." He felt not the slightest guilt for telling two brazen lies in a single sentence. "And it gets me out of the house - if I'm not around, mom can't make me clean my room!"

This made Anita laugh. "You sneaky little mini!l;.,"

"Hey, what can I say? I'm a genius. So where do you live, Anita?"

"Oh...I work at the factory a few levels up. They have me as a computer repair tech."

"Okay - but where do you _live?_"

The question seemed to make Anita slightly uncomfortable. "Well...the company has places for us...I don't think you'd know about them..."

Without warning a gentle _dee-ooh, dee-ooh _issued from Anita's armband. She looked down and tapped a button, silencing it.

"Aw fritz. Calvin, I have to leave now. My next work cycle is starting." Rest-time is over." Anita began heading to one of the four corners of the food court. Small crowds were beginning to form there; apparently a lot of other people had to go back to work.

"Will I see you later?" Calvin called after her.

"One in a thousand, Calvin. But have a glad time exploring!"

Anita claimed standing room on what looked like a floating platform, jam-packed with people in red and green uniforms. The resulting scene looked for all the world like that in a crowded elevator in Calvin's own time.

"Double-blick, everyone! Only five minutes before the shift starts!"

"Hold on - I dropped my smartphone."

"Mind extracting your shoulder out of my face?"

"**OW!** Scan where you're stepping!"

"My bad!"

A few more people managed to edge on amid protests about personal space. Finally someone reached out and operated a simple control panel sticking up from one side of the platform. A translucent white field of light formed around the sides and extended all the way up to the floor above. While a fascinated Calvin watched, the entire platform rose smoothly up into the air, soon followed by the three others.

Had not the young time traveler been watching Anita until the last second, he would have noticed that one of them didn't go straight up. Instead it hovered back into a recess in the wall that suddenly opened and _then _began its ascent. In it's place another platform descended from above and came to rest at floor level.

* * *

The black-garbed man took one look at the food court and swore under his breath. _And I'm supposed to search this whole area? How?!_

The mysterious 'unknown' he'd been told to look for was, to quote his direct superior, 'an unusual person or entity' that might have passed through this area recently. Easier said than done.

A quick look-around proved fruitless. There were too many people moving about to get a close look at all of them. He toyed with the idea of questioning some, but rejected the idea as soon as it came to him. After all - they were only low-level techs and factory grunts. It would take something pretty strange to stick in their little brains...and as a group they hated 'spooks' like him anyhow.

_Better try the local security terminal. Maybe the cameras saw something._

He proceeded to a panel in the wall, unobtrusively labeled with a 'Authorized Persons Only" sign in small print, and touched a small button on his badge. The panel received the authorization code and slid open noiselessly. Inside was a small computer terminal complete with a miniature vertical keyboard.

The officer called up the cameras for the four elevator shafts. "Computer! Run ICUO algorithm. Search: security video, localized, public lift platforms. Time: one standard hour to current capture."

_**Breep!**_ "Valid input. ICUO program is now running."

That would run through the video and look for any highly unusual happenings captured by the security cameras, thus serving as extensions of the officer's eyes.

_Sure hope this finds something..._

* * *

Calvin stared up at where the lift had vanished. All he could see now was that the ceiling didn't have hardly any lights on it - the rest were all recessed into the walls.

_Oh well. It was nice meeting someone from the future. And I got some free candy besides!_

He observed the lighting scheme with interest for a minute before remembering that he had somewhere to go. Reluctantly Calvin reached heaved the backpack around and set it in front of him. But as he searched for the right page again, a figure among the crowd caught his eye. It was a policeman.

Calvin's blood ran cold. _Uh oh! They followed me!_

Fortunately he seemed to be busy with something at the moment...but at any second Calvin was certain he'd whirl around and yell 'freeze!'. To make matters worse, the crowd around him was rapidly thinning out as people went up on the platforms or walked out through one of the four exits.

Heart pounding, Calvin looked for a place to hide. _Behind the vending machines? No way! I gotta get out of here!_ He hastily put his backpack back on and tiptoed toward the nearest exit, all the while nervously watching the officer. Somehow the archway seemed like miles in the distance. But despite his worst fears the officer was engrossed in whatever he was doing.

The instant Calvin had passed through the lights and heard the _'bing!'_ he was off like a rocket. He ran like mad, taking turns at random. Soon he was out of sight of the food court and still going.

Finally the young boy slowed down to a walk. His heart was still beating a tatoo on his chest, but the immediate terror had worn off.

Calvin looked around. He'd stopped in the middle of a nondescript length of walkway. Once again he was the only living thing in sight. Two tall potted plants next to a stately door were the only other living things.

With all sense of direction lost Calvin began walking just for the sake of moving. He saw that the walkway lead to a three-way intersection just ahead and mentally decided to turn right.

Rounding the corner, he came upon a man in a dull silver suit on his knees working on something in the middle of another stretch of walkway. Carefully Calvin snuck around behind and looked over his shoulder. The 'something' proved to be an open panel underneath a card slot much like one Calvin had seen at a hotel. More interesting was the fact that the panel was right next to a small, fancy elevator exactly like one in his time.

As Calvin watched, the man finished a small chip into place and touched a needle-like probe to the circuits leading into it. "Uh huh...good...good...good...annnd - good! Hah! That did the trick!"

The man placed the probe in a small toolbelt around his waist and reached behind him for an object resembling an oversized cellphone. He couldn't find it with his hands and looked back...right into Calvin's face.

"Hel-lo there..."

"Hi." Calvin reached down and handed the object to him.

"Thanks. Name's Max."

"I'm Calvin."

"Then hello, Calvin." Max reached back with his other arm and shook his hand.

"Fixing the elevator?"

"Almost finished." He began tapping out a message. "Tell my supervisor I got it working and...there."

"So what was wrong with it?"

For an answer Max reached into another of his toolbelt pouches. "That would be because of this little gizmo." He held up something for Calvin's examination.

In Max's hand was a hexagonal computer chip. On top it was colored coal-black with a golden lock symbol while the bottom sported hundreds of tiny pins.

"That's it? What's it do?"

"This beauty is the security processor. See, this card slot is one of the _really_ secure kinds. In order to verify the cards being swiped, it needs one of these. It checks every little thing ten times over."

"Wow!"

"Yep. Pretty secure. Thing is, they do enough checking for errors or circuit wear that it's ridiculous. When they say they're broken you can always get a year more life out of them at least...but security inspectors don't like you doing that."

"If it say's it's broken, it's broken."

"Exactly."

"Can I have it?"

Max lifted an eyebrow. "You sure?" Calvin nodded eagerly. "Don't see why not. Just don't plug it into anything."

He dropped the processor into Calvin's outstretched hands. It was far heavier than it looked and felt rather warm to the touch. The ecstatic young boy gently unzipped the pocket Hobbes was in and gently placed his newfound treasure inside.

"Well...I had better get back for my next job order. Nice talking to you." Slowly Max closed the panel and stood up, rubbing his lower legs. He noticed Calvin examining the elevator. "You looking for a way down?"

"Yeah!"

With a look of caution on his face, Max around to ensure they were alone. "Anyone around the corner back there?"

"Just me."

"Good! I'll use my card." In a flash Max pulled out a silverish card and slipped it through the slot. A pleasant tone sounded, and the door slid open.

"Just keep this quiet, and don't stick around at the bottom. It's 'supposed' to be a reserved lift."

A mischevious wink told Max he needn't worry. He returned the wink and grinned knowingly. With a wave of his hand he began jogging off down the walkway.

Calvin bounded into the elevator. Inside it was white with chrome trim and quite small; room enough for four people at most. There were only two buttons to push - 'U' and 'L'. At the moment 'U' was flashing.Their meanings were obvious enough "U is for up, L is for...low? Whatever. I bet I know what they do." With an air of confidence he stabbed the 'L' button.

Softly the door closed and the elevator began a swift but gentle ride downward. "_Oh_, aren't I smart?"

After a moment of gratuitous self-congratulation, Calvin thought that now might be a good time to find out where he was going. He opened his backpack and extracted both Hobbes and the printed map. Hobbes he laid on the floor, and the map he began shuffling through.

"Okay...where the heck am I?"

"Well, I'm no Boy Scout, but I'd guess you're in an elevator."

Calvin looked to see his tiger friend lying on the floor, curled against the curved walls. "Hey Hobbes!"

"Hey to you too. What's this now? We're lost?"

"Uhh...we're not quite 'lost'...I just don't know where we are."

Hobbes rolled his eyes. "I hate to break it to you, but isn't that the exact definition of lost?"

"No! Lost is when you have no idea where you are at all and you're wandering around like an idiot. I know that both of us are still somewhere on one of these maps - I just don't know where we are on the map. That's all. C'mere, maybe you know where we are."

Hobbes twitched his whiskers. "I'm afraid I was in a dark little backpack pocket until ten seconds ago. Still...I suppose I'd better try. What level were we on before you got on this elevator?"

"The one with the food court."

"Good." The tiger stretched out a paw and leafed through the papers. "Hmm. This is a pretty small elevator...and these little round things with x's through them...Calvin, look at the walkways. Do either of them look like where you just were?"

Calvin looked closely. There were two likely places, but only one of them had a 3-way intersection leading directly into it. "There! That's it!"

"Ah, now we're getting somewhere." Quickly Hobbes looked at the map for the level immediately below the food court. "Hmm! It does right through! So it must end somewhere below that..." he grabbed for another page and compared it with the first. "...bingo. Found it. Calvin, our next stop is in a residential area."

* * *

Hobbes sat on the floor next to Calvin, listening as his friend was filled him in on what he'd missed. "So Max let you in as a little favor to a stranger?"

"Yep. And here we are."

"Fascinating." He rubbed his chin thoughtfully.

"So what was that about 'it goes right through?' "

"I was observing that this elevator doesn't stop at level five, according to the map."

"Really? That's weird. Any idea why it's so small and fancy?"

"Simple. It isn't open to the general public. Just look at all the chrome trim - it's so polished you can see yourself in it. You wouldn't find this in any old elevator."

Calvin looked concerned. "So what about where we're going? Are there gonna be more people?"

"Definitely. 'Residential' means homes and homes mean people. Which means that...that you'd better carry me again." Hobbes sighed.

His friend patted him on the back. "Sorry pal."

"Ahh, it's not that bad. I won't perish from another stint or two as backpack filler. Let's find the quickest route to that museum first."

The pair examined the map together. The absolute quickest path was fairly straightforward, but Hobbes chose a series of detours he hoped would help Calvin stay relatively unnoticed. With the route chosen Hobbes gave a few quick tips to his young friend.

"Stick to the less-public areas unless the detours look dangerous. Be polite but mind your own business unless someone talks to you directly, and if they do say as little as possible except that you're going to the museum. 'Going exploring' isn't a great excuse, and the next person you meet may be nosier than Max or Anita. And for heavens sakes don't run - that's suspicious."

Calvin seemed to pay close attention. "Got it. Stay out of sight, mind my own beeswax, and don't run."

"Good boy. And add 'act casual' to that list."

"Okay. So what about my mission?"

Hobbes blinked. "Mission? What 'mission?' "

"Ho-obbes! I've got to get something to bring back to the present!"

"Don't you already have a few souvenirs?"

"Two candy bars and an almost-worn-out computer chip. Those are worthless! If I don't get something _**useful**_, I can't say I invented it and get rich. That's why we came here in the first place!"

His tiger friend sighed softly. That _was _their - or at least Calvin's _- _motive for this whole escapade. And as hairbrained and dangerous an idea as it was, Hobbes knew that his young companion would never abandon it until he found something or was in extreme danger. He took a moment to think and form a workable answer.

"Allright. Can it wait until we reach the museum?"

"Why? What for?"

"The future museum should have plenty of information on things that could be 'new' in our time but are 'old' and outdated now. Instead of rummaging through trash or trying to steal something, we might be able to figure out how to build something that will make you rich when we get home."

"I dunno, Hobbes." Calvin looked skeptical. "But...okay. But if we can't find something there, we're not leaving until it's suppertime or until we _**do **_find something. Deal?"

"Deal." _Better that than having him running wild all over this place._ "Shake on it?"

As paw and hand shook on the compromise, a melodious female voice came from some overhead speaker.

_"Approaching - lower - floor. Please stay clear of the entrance."_

In a flash Hobbes turned back into a plushie. Calvin crammed him into the backpack just as the door to the elevator opened. Cautiously he stepped out, looking left and right for people. He was lucky once again - there was no one around.

The room was set in the middle of a short hallway, with voices coming from behind several closed doors. Although the room itself was smallish someone had done well decorating it. All four walls were covered in an neutral purple-hued pattern, and a fancy placards next to the elevator door stated "Not for general access."

Calvin's ears picked up the swishing sound of a door opening. Two voices were suddenly loud and clear - and they were getting closer in a hurry.

_Uh oh! __**Now**__ where to hide?! _

This time Calvin had even less options. There was nothing to hide behind, and the elevator required an access card. He could try to run - but that would almost surely end in disaster.

The voices were coming closer, from the hallway to the left. Only one thing left to do. Calvin flattened himself against the wall next to the entrance. It was only a cheesy movie trick...

But it worked. Two well-manicured gentlemen in handsome grey suits walked right past him. They were engaged in discussing some sort of business deal and were too occupied to notice much.

One of them suddenly stopped by the elevator. Calvin began inching to the side, trying to get out of his peripheral vision.

"Hold on Reginald. Let me see if someone's fixed the lift yet." In a smooth motion a silver card slid through the slot. To the apparent surprise of the gentlemen, the door slid open, and a soft voice intoned "Lower floor - going up."

"Ah! Finally. This should save us a bit of footwork. You first old boy."

Calvin darted off around the left corner the instant the elevator door shut behind them. Unfortunately he quickly found himself in a strange hallway in an even stranger building. He would have been lost entirely had not a nearby sign said "--Lobby" and correctly guessed there was a way in and out to be found in that direction.

There was indeed a door in the lobby. A two-seat receptionist's desk nearby was deserted and a placard hung over the front, stating "Out 2 break. Be back soon."

Without a pause Calvin tore out the door at top speed. He blazed a trail to the nearest turn and raced down a side path. The young boy ran the distance of almost a half mile, following the winding path through the level that Hobbes had outlined. Finally he arrived at a pair of the platform-elevators, panting hard.

A half dozen well-groomed men and women were waiting for the next platform down. They wore armbands of slightly fancier design and talked causally amongst themselves.

"...so what's on your schedule?"

"Not a ton. Maybe glim a holo-vid or two I've been wanting to see. You?"

"Go home and laze. That presentation was murder."

"You're lucky," muttered a short man, " that you don't have to keep working at home."

"What - did Bascomb give you another project?"

"As if I didn't have too much to do already. That dumb yes-man of his..."

Calvin stayed at the edge of the group, continuing to eavesdrop. Soon enough a platform came from the level below. Everyone boarded in an orderly fashion, including the young eavesdropper who snuck on near the edge.

A grey-haired man typed in several numbers on a control pedestal and pushed a green button. But just as the platform began to descend he happened to notice Calvin and looked quite surprised. "Well now, who's this?"

All eyes turned to the young boy. He quickly surmised that he was unexpected and perhaps unwanted here.

_Act casual, buster, act casual._ "Me? I'm Calvin."

The stranger raised one eyebrow. "Ah! And just where did you come from?"

Calvin's brain again raced for a good answer. Before he knew it, however, his mouth acted independently of his mind. With a wise-guy smile on his face Calvin heard himself remark "Well...my mother always said I came from the stork. Where did you come from?"

That remark caught everyone completely off-guard, Calvin included. The stranger goggled and turned beet red. Men and women laughed hard at his wholly unexpected and slightly naughty response.

Mercifully the ride down to the next lower level was a short one. Everyone except the man who had first questioned Calvin were still snickering and whispering that kids sure said the darndest things.

Finally the platform locked in place. Calvin remarked, "bye mister! Hope you find out where you're from!" and disappeared around the nearest corner.

Amidst renewed laughter the rest of the group went their separate ways, dispersing into the open plaza. Their workday was finished and most were looking forward to some entertainment. They would all forget the quick-witted boy by the end of the day.

All except for one man. That man, Bosco by name, had been intrigued. Although wished he could report the little upstart to his parents, he liked to remember things that piqued his curiosity...and this 'Calvin' certainly deserved a mental file of his own.


End file.
